PDFBox comes with a series of command line utilities. They are available as Windows binaries and as standard Java applications.
See the Dependencies page for instructions on how to set your classpath in order to run PDFBox tools as Java applications.
In order to run them as window applications you will need to have the .NET framework installed and add %PDFBOX_HOME%\bin to your path.
This application will convert a PDF that uses one colorspace to another. For example, all RGB colors to CMYK colors. Currently this only supports changing text and vector graphics and does not convert images.
usage: java -jar pdfbox-app-x.y.z.jar org.apache.pdfbox.ConvertColorspace [OPTIONS] <inputfile> <outputfile>
| Command Line Parameter | Description |
|---|---|
| -password | The password to the PDF document. |
| -equiv | Color equivalent to use for conversion. |
| inputfile | The PDF file to convert. |
| outputfile | The file to save the converted document to. Must be different of input file |
The format for the color equivalent described above is
Colorspace(values)=Colorspace(values)
RGB(255,0,0)=CMYK(0,99,100,0)
RGB are integers between 0 and 255
CMYK are integers between 0 and 100
This option can be used as many times as necessary.
This application will decrypt a PDF document.
NOTE: You must have the owner password to decrypt the document!
usage: java -jar pdfbox-app-x.y.z.jar Decrypt [OPTIONS] <inputfile> [outputfile]
| Command Line Parameter | Description |
|---|---|
| -password | Password to the PDF or certificate in keystore. |
| -keyStore | Path to keystore that holds certificate to decrypt the document. This is only required if the document is encrypted with a certificate, otherwise only the password is required. |
| -alias | The alias to the certificate in the keystore. |
| inputfile | The PDF file to decrypt. |
| outputfile | The file to save the decrypted document to. If left blank then it will be the same as the input file. |
This application will encrypt a PDF document.
usage: java -jar pdfbox-app-x.y.z.jar Encrypt [OPTIONS] <password> <inputfile>
| Command Line Parameter | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|
| -O | The owner password to the PDF, ignored if -certFile is specified. | |
| -U | The user password to the PDF, ignored if -certFile is specified. | |
| -certFile | Path to X.509 cert file. | |
| -canAssemble | true | Set the assemble permission. |
| -canExtractContent | true | Set the extraction permission. |
| -canExtractForAccessibility | true | Set the extraction permission. |
| -canFillInForm | true | Set the fill in form permission. |
| -canModify | true | Set the modify permission. |
| -canModifyAnnotations | true | Set the modify annots permission. |
| -canPrint | true | Set the print permission. |
| -canPrintDegraded | true | Set the print degraded permission. |
| -keyLength | 40 | The number of bits for the encryption key. |
| inputfile> | The PDF file to encrypt. | |
| outputfile | The file to save the encrypted document to. If left blank then it will be the same as the input file. |
This application will extract all text from the given PDF document.
usage: java -jar pdfbox-app-x.y.z.jar ExtractText [OPTIONS] <inputfile> [Text file]
| Command Line Parameter | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|
| -password | The password to the PDF document. | |
| -encoding | default encoding | The encoding type of the text file, e.g. ISO-8859-1, UTF-8, UTF-16BE. |
| -console | false | Send text to console instead of file. |
| -html | false | Output in HTML format instead of raw text. |
| -sort | false | Sort the text before writing. |
| -ignoreBeads | false | Disables the separation by beads. |
| -force | false | Enables pdfbox to ignore corrupt objects. |
| -debug | false | Enables debug output about the time consumption of every stage. |
| -startPage | 1 | The first page to extract, one based. |
| -endPage | Integer.MAX_INT | The last page to extract, one based. |
| -nonSeq | false | Use the new non sequential parser. |
This application will overlay one document with the content of another document
usage: java -jar pdfbox-app-x.y.z.jar Overlay <overlay.pdf> <document.pdf> <result.pdf>
If the overlay document contains more than one page the pages are overlayed to the document on order e.g. if the document has 10 pages and the overlay contains 2 pages the order is Document: 1234567890 Overlay: 1212121212
This application will send a pdf document to the printer.
You must have the correct permissions to print the document!
usage: java -jar pdfbox-app-x.y.z.jar PrintPDF [OPTIONS] <inputfile>
| Command Line Parameter | Description |
|---|---|
| -password | The password to decrypt the PDF. |
| -silentPrint | Print the PDF without prompting for a printer. |
| inputfile | The PDF file to print. |
This application will take an existing PDF document and allows to analyze and inspect the internal structure
usage: java -jar pdfbox-app-x.y.z.jar PDFDebugger [inputfile]
| Command Line Parameter | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|
| -password | The password to the PDF document. | |
| -nonSeq | false | Use the new non sequential parser. |
| inputfile | the name of an optional PDF file to open. |
This application will take a list of pdf documents and merge them, saving the result in a new document.
usage: java -jar pdfbox-app-x.y.z.jar PDFMerger <Source PDF files (2 ..n)> <Target PDF file>
An application to read PDF documents. This will provide Acrobat Reader like functionality.
usage: java -jar pdfbox-app-x.y.z.jar PDFReader [PDF file]
| Command Line Parameter | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|
| -password | The password to the PDF document. | |
| -nonSeq | false | Use the new non sequential parser. |
| PDF file | the name of an optional PDF file to open |
This application will take an existing PDF document and split it into a number of other documents
usage: java -jar pdfbox-app-x.y.z.jar PDFSplit [OPTIONS] <PDF file>
| Command Line Parameter | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|
| -password | The password to the PDF document. | |
| -split | Number of pages of every splitted part of the pdf. | |
| -startPage | The page to start at. | |
| -endPage | The page to stop at. | |
| -nonSeq | false | Use the new non sequential parser. |
Examples:
This application will create an image for every page in the PDF document.
usage: java -jar pdfbox-app-x.y.z.jar PDFToImage [OPTIONS] <PDF file>
| Command Line Parameter | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|
| -password | The password to the PDF document. | |
| -imageType | jpg | The image type to write to. Currently only jpg or png. |
| -outputPrefix | Name of PDF document | The prefix to the image file. |
| -startPage | 1 | The first page to convert, one based. |
| -endPage | Integer.MAX_INT | The last page to convert, one based. |
| -nonSeq | false | Use the new non sequential parser. |
This application will create a PDF document from a text file.
usage: java -jar pdfbox-app-x.y.z.jar TextToPDF [OPTIONS] <outputfile> <textfile>
| Command Line Parameter | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|
| -standardFont | Helvetica | The font to use for the text. Either this or -ttf should be specified but not both. |
| -ttf | The TTF font to use for the text. Either this or -standardFont should be specified but not both. | |
| -fontSize | 10 | The size of the font to use. |
The following font names can be used for the parameter standardFont:
An application to decompress PDF documents.
usage: java -jar pdfbox-app-x.y.z.jar WriteDecodedDoc <input-file> <output-file>
| Command Line Parameter | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|
| -password | The password to the PDF document. | |
| -nonSeq | false | Use the new non sequential parser. |
| The PDF file to decompress | ||
| The destination PDF file |